Who came up with the idea to make an animated film out of Bashō’s haiku?
Actually, the idea to make a film based on a cycle of Basho’s poetry, called “renku” or “linked verse”, was proposed by the Japanese. The “renku” cycle comprises 36 strophes, so the concept of the project was to give each strophe to a different director. Each director was to do a small piece without any limits on style, script or form, meaning completely in accord with his individuality. After that, the small pieces would be strung together. The Japanese decided that it was to be an international project, so they had invited different directors from China, Canada, Belgium, England, Russia and so on, a total of 35. Each director had to make a 30-second piece. Later, the artistic director, Kihachiro Kawamoto, would string together the different pieces, bridging them each by a narrator reading the verses. I was assigned the first three verses that open the cycle “Winter Days”. Immediately I thought out a winter plot: A boy is cooking a meal on a brazier. He throws on some coal. The shoji
